sand and smoke and summertime
by mad not sad
Summary: He thinks he could get used to holding her like this. Ryder/Kitty


**A/N**: You guys you guys I think Kitty and Ryder are actually going to happen on _Glee_! Watch the promo for "Sadie Hawkins" – Ryder's looking at her in a way that I suppose _could_ mean "oh hey there random girl standing next to me," but that I'm pretty sure means "I'm going to have eye sex with you for the next few episodes or however long it takes us to get together." I'm not making this up!

ANYWAY. This oneshot is meant to take place during the summer right before Season Four. I mixed up the order of the sections, but I added dates before each so hopefully you can follow the timeline well enough.

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_sand and smoke and summertime_

© All Rights to writing Reserved

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_summer's in the air and baby heaven's in your eyes_

national anthem, lana del rey

..

**august twenty-seventh**

He knows it's over before she even opens her mouth to say it. He can tell by the way she stares fixedly at a point just beyond his head, the way her eyes are guarded and hollow, the way her jaw is set and her lips pressed together.

"Don't say it," Ryder tells her, his hands balling into fists, his eyes flashing.

She looks at him then. She bites her lip and she _looks_ at him. She looks at him with hazel eyes, wide and misty, and he can hardly believe that she has the fucking nerve to look at him like that, considering what he knows she is about to tell him. "I –" she starts tremulously.

"Don't fucking bother," he spits.

Kitty takes a hesitant step toward him, looking like she's about to cry. "_Ryder_," she says softly, and he screws his eyes shut at the sound. What the_ fuck_ gives her the right to say his name like that when she's nothing but a cold, heartless bitch?

"I'm so sorry," she continues, and he's never felt more like punching something. Oh, wait, apparently he actually _did_ just punch the wall. _Shit_, he thinks, cradling his aching knuckles in his left hand.

She makes like she is about to go to him, to cradle his hand in hers, but he wards her off with an icy glare. "I should have known," he snarls. "I should have fucking known. You told me yourself – 'I like to play games,' remember?" and he sees her pained expression at the memory.

Kitty lets out a soft whimper, and he refuses to allow himself to feel sorry for her, to want to go to her and kiss away her tears and cradle her in his arms and tell her it's all going to be better. _Stay away from her_, they'd warned him, but of course he hadn't listened.

"Well congratulations, Kitty," he tells her in a low voice, and she looks up at him in confusion, blinking back tears. "You've won, just like always." And then he storms away and pretends he doesn't hear the sound of her sobs.

..

**june fifth**

"Will you sign my yearbook?"

Kitty sneers disdainfully at the pimply, glasses-wearing nerd standing nervously before her, the McKinley yearbook held out in his skinny arms. She smirks. "The answer to that is the same as the one to the question, 'Will you lose your virginity before the age of thirty-five?'" she tells him contemptuously, and then she pivots on her heel and is striding down the hallway in the opposite direction before he can even process her response.

She struts down the crowded hallway, occasionally deigning to smile at one of her classmates or wave her fingers half-heartedly at a good-looking athlete. "Have a good summer, Kitty!" one of her fellow Cheerios gushes.

Kitty responds with her fakest grin. "You too," she coos, and then waits until the girl walks away before adding under her breath, "you fat, ugly whore."

_Thank sweet baby Jesus this school year is finally over_, Kitty thinks as she makes her way out the front doors of McKinley and revels in the warmth of the early June sun on her skin. She only bothers to attend school for three things: one, insulting the losers and geeks who filled McKinley's halls every day; two, making every other girl jealous of her perfect body in her Cheerios uniform; and three, flirting with the occasional hot guy she happens to spot in class or on the football field. Otherwise, she has no use for the annoyances of learning, homework, and tests.

She smiles when she imagines what this summer has in store for her – lazy days by the pool, working on getting the perfect tan, sipping sugar-free lemonade. Throw in a hot lifeguard and she'll have it made. _Hmm_, Kitty schemes, _and there's always the neighbors' son who will be back from college this summer. I hope he still likes to cut the grass shirtless_.

Her lips curl up at the anticipation of a new conquest. She saunters past the picnic tables full of elated students, and she's almost made it to the parking lot when she spots something even better than her mental image of the neighbor boy's abs – the entire football team, laughing and pushing each other around as excited, testosterone-filled boys are wont to do.

_Mmm, yes please_, she purrs in her head as she takes in the sight of the football players' muscular arms, their tanned faces, their toned chests, their broad shoulders. Kitty decides to add a little detour to her route to the parking lot, and she strolls over to walk casually by the group of rowdy athletes.

They greet her when they see her walking past, a few of them wolf-whistling and one of them shouting, "Hey, Wilde, wanna show me your splits later tonight?"

Kitty just smirks at him. "Oh, please, we all know you need to work on your scoring technique," she teases.

The other boys laugh at her insult to their teammate, and Kitty breezes on past them, feeling their eyes on her and loving it. She means to keep moving past them, but her eyes catch on a boy with floppy brown hair. She sees his eyes rake slowly up her legs, her hips, her waist, her chest, before finally coming up to meet her gaze. He flushes faintly when he realizes that she had noticed his once-over, and Kitty feels an unfamiliar flipping feeling in her stomach when she takes in the intensity of his brown eyes.

_Ryder Lynn_. He's like a shrine to the gods of football and male athleticism and attractiveness, all wrapped up in one yummy, sexy package of fuck-me eyes and a tousle of brown hair. Looks like she's found her summer fling, then.

Kitty winks at him as she walks out to the cars and is only mildly alarmed when she spends the first few days of summer vacation unable to get his soulful eyes out of her head. She tells herself that all she needs to do to get him out of her brain is to hook up with him a couple times, then he'll be just another name in the long list of guys she's used and tossed away like last year's shoes.

So as she forms her plan to get him she reminds herself, over and over, _It'll just be a quick fling. Just a fling. It's not going to last_.

Because it can't last, it can't, and if she thinks anything else then she's just deluding herself. Because she's Kitty Wilde and she doesn't do this bullshit, this fantasizing about some guy's eyes and this imagining what it would be like to hold his hand in the hallway at school next fall…no.

_It's not going to last._

..

**june eleventh**

"Cannonball!" Phil shouts as he jumps into the Surettes' backyard pool, water spraying everywhere.

Ryder laughs, shaking his head to get the water out of his eyes. "Dude," he tells him, "did you have to do that?"

"Hell yeah!" Phil replies, grinning.

Ryder chuckles and shakes his head, swimming away from him. Their teammate Bobby is throwing one of his legendary summer pool parties, and most of the football team is there, along with a few of the players' girlfriends and various other cheerleaders and hot girls.

Ryder treads water in the deep end, his face half submerged so that only his eyes peek over the water's surface. He stares at a collection of beach chairs assembled on the Surettes' deck. Reclining on the chairs are four of the hottest girls at McKinley, clad only in sunglasses and the skimpiest of string bikinis. Bobby and the others had begged the girls to come in the water with everyone else, but they had refused, arguing that they need to work on their tans. The football players can hardly help sneaking glances at them, their flat, tanned stomachs, their long, long legs shiny with tanning oil, their chests, covered only by tiny triangles of fabric.

Ryder, though, only has eyes for one of the girls – in fact, he's hardly found himself able to look away from her during the entire party. _Get it together_, he scolds himself, but he can't find the strength to tear his gaze away from her. The way one of her knees is slightly bent, the way her curves ease into each other like the fluid notes of a song, the way her blonde hair falls over her shoulder, the way her pink lips are curled into a mysterious smirk, even now, with her eyes closed and her head back.

She always looks like she knows a secret, a dangerous and delicious secret that no one else can know. And oh, Ryder knows what everyone says about her – _Stay away from her, man, she's a crazy bitch –_ but he can't help himself from wanting to find out just what that devious secret of hers is.

He spent all of last year lusting after her at football games, watching her performance during halftime, getting constantly distracted by her cheers from the sidelines. He's heeded the advice of his friends (_Stay away_) for so long but it's becoming like an _itch_ he can't scratch, a throbbing and ever-present itch, and he doesn't think he can keep up this self-control for much longer…

_Screw it_, he decides, and he swims over to the edge of the pool in three quick, decisive strokes before hoisting himself out of the water, the sunlight glistening on his wet skin as he stands up on the deck.

He sees the three other girls she's with tittering to each other as he makes his way over to their chairs, eyeing him up and down, whispering to each other behind their hands and giggling. Kitty, however, is the only one who doesn't seem to notice his approach. Her face remains perfectly serene, save for that omnipresent little smirk.

He finally arrives and he stands at the foot of her chair, her three friends looking up at him expectantly. Ryder wonders for a moment what the _hell_ he had been thinking – why would he choose _now_, of all times, to finally make his move on her? – but he pushes his hesitation out of his mind and grins suavely at the other girls. "You girls sure you don't want to come for a swim?" he asks.

They giggle, but Ryder's eyes are intent on Kitty, who finally cracks her eyes open at the sound of his voice. They appraise each other coolly, her hazel eyes taking in his dripping hair and his shirtless chest.

"I don't know," one of the other girls says, "I guess maybe we could…I am getting a little hot," she smiles up at Ryder.

"Well then why don't you jump in?" he replies. "I think we're going to start a game of Marco Polo soon."

All he has to do is look at each of the girls with his best bedroom eyes and then the three of them are out of their seats, giggling as they push each other into the pool, to a chorus of cheers from the boys already swimming.

And then it's just Kitty and Ryder left on the deck, him standing in front of her with water dripping down his body, her languorously stretched out in her chair.

He ignores how daunting it actually is to finally be talking to her alone and lets his mouth curl into a smirk. "What, don't you want to get _wet_?" he asks her in a low voice, enjoying the way her eyes widen ever so slightly when he places extra emphasis on the last word.

"Oh, I do," Kitty responds, looking up at him daringly. "But are you sure you're ready for me? I'll probably win at Marco Polo," she tells him confidently.

Ryder advances toward her, his eyes determined. "Don't be too sure about that," he replies, and then he holds out a hand to help her out of her chair.

She takes it gracefully and slides up out of her chair, and he brazenly rests a hand on her bare back as they make their way over to the edge of the pool. And then, before Ryder can think through how badly she might injure him for this, he pushes her into the water, laughing as she screams in surprise.

"Ryder Lynn!" she shrieks after she resurfaces, spluttering and reaching up to wipe the water out of her eyes. "I'm going to –"

"Easy, easy," he laughs, crouching down so he's closer to her level. "I'm sorry. Here, I'll help you out," he says, and he reaches out a hand for her to take so he can pull her up.

She smiles at him then, and that's the moment when he first realizes that he might have a small problem on his hands here, because the feeling he gets when he sees her hazel eyes twinkling at him like that isn't just _Damn, I can't wait to get into her pants_ (although he feels that too) – it's something else, something more, something very, very dangerous.

"Okay," she responds, and then she places her small hand in his and abruptly gives his arm a hard yank. He's taken off guard, and he loses his balance, toppling over into the pool.

She's laughing when he comes up for air, and he makes a move to lunge for her. Kitty swims away teasingly, her body moving sinuously through the rippling water. Ryder gives her a few seconds' lead to make her think she can get away from him, and then reaches out and grabs her, his hands sliding easily over her waist.

"Gotcha," he murmurs, grinning down at her.

She smirks and brings a hand up to run through his wet brown hair. It feels so nice that Ryder almost closes his eyes in bliss right then, before he remembers himself. "I still think I can beat you in Marco Polo," she asserts, her eyes shining up at him.

He's still holding her to him in the water, and he is unable to help himself from stroking one of his hands gently along her smooth stomach. "Oh, really?" he replies playfully.

"Mm-hmm," she nods, letting her hand trail slowly down the back of his head to his neck. "I like to play games," she purrs, that secretive look back on her face, the look that Ryder is mesmerized by.

Ryder grins lazily at her, pulling her a little closer up against him, loving the feeling of her wet body pressed against his.

Kitty leans her head over, and Ryder almost forgets how to breathe when he feels her hot breath on his hear. "And I always win," she whispers to him, her lips tickling his skin.

And that's how it begins.

..

**august twenty-fifth**

She hears the familiar ping of a pebble against her window, and she slips out of her bed to peer outside. She looks down, and sure enough, there's Ryder, standing in her yard, his grin visible even in the dark of night.

Kitty slides out her bedroom door and tiptoes down the hallway, down the stairs, over to the back door. She eases it open quietly, and Ryder slips inside. He smiles down at her and kisses her on the top of her head. "Hi," he whispers.

"Hey," Kitty breathes back, and then she holds a finger to her lips as they sneak quietly back up the stairs, down the hallway, and into Kitty's room.

He closes the door behind them and winces at the sound it makes, and she giggles at his caution.

"What?" he whispers, coming over to lie next to her on her bed. "You're the one who's always going on about your parents and their no-boys-in-the-house rule."

She nestles into his side and sighs contentedly as he strokes her back. "Don't worry, we didn't wake them up," she whispers.

Ryder begins to press kisses into her bare shoulder, her neck, her jaw. "What do you think they'd do," he murmurs, "if they caught me in here with you?"

Kitty smiles at the feeling of his hot lips caressing her skin. "Probably kill you," she sighs, tangling her fingers into his hair.

"Oh, that's all, then," he replies sarcastically, and she laughs quietly.

And then they have no time for conversation, because they've slid each other's shirts off, she's rid him of his pants and boxers, and he's ripped off her underwear, tossed recklessly over the side of the bed.

She scratches at his shoulderblades, he rakes his fingers down her waist. She has to bite his shoulder to muffle her cry as he moves inside of her. He strokes her hair soothingly and murmurs made-up words into her neck. She feels every nerve ending in her body explode, oh oh oh oh and on forever, it's like flying, it's like falling, and she never wants it to end.

The moonlight floods through her window and illuminates the planes of his body. He looks like something celestial, something divine, and Kitty bites down so hard on her lip that she draws blood when she thinks about how perfect he is.

_Ryder Lynn_. She remembers thinking about him on the last day of school, back when all he was to her was a yummy, sexy package of fuck-me eyes and tousled brown hair. She remembers him daring her to go in the water at Bobby Surette's pool party, him lying in the grass in her backyard looking at her like she was the only thing left on earth, him making her laugh with silly stories by the lake. And she remembers his eyes lit up with fireworks on the Fourth of July.

And each memory is more perfect than the last but if she thinks about them then she also uncovers the painful truth – he was supposed to be just a quick, meaningless fling, just another name in the long list of guys she's used and tossed away like last year's shoes, but she'd failed miserably at that, hadn't she, because now her world depends on him. Now he can turn around her day with one lazy grin, now he can get her to laugh like no one else can, now he can make her body feel things she'd never dreamed she could, now he can see through her act and break down all her walls to get to the lonely little girl she is inside.

And it terrifies her.

"I love you," he breathes into her skin, cradling her in his arms. If she looks up into his eyes she knows she'll see heaven and hell and everything on earth that she's ever wanted, and she's terrified, she's terrified, she's _terrified_.

Kitty makes up her mind right then and there – she's going to have to end this, and soon. Because _this _is no longer just a summer fling, no, _this_ is her whole world, and she's terrified.

Later, he tucks her covers around her and presses a kiss to her forehead and slips out of her house into the night. And she curls up into her pillow and cries for an hour after he leaves, because she can already feel her heart breaking when she imagines telling him it's over.

..

**july thirty-first**

"Tell me a story," Kitty commands languidly, perched on a little hill of sand like some kind of water goddess. They are by the lake, the only ones on the sandy shore.

Ryder smiles indulgently at her, lying on his stomach and idly running his fingers up and down her sandy leg. "What kind of story?" he questions, playing along. Of course, he would do pretty much anything for Kitty, and the worst part is that she knows it.

She looks down at him musingly, working her lower lip with her teeth in contemplation. "Well, I used to like stories about princesses," she tells him, and she gets a far-off look in her eyes that he burns into his memory so he'll never forget it. "Princesses, and castles, and knights and dragons."

"So you like fairytales," Ryder responds, admiring how soft the skin of her leg feels under his rough fingers.

"Not anymore," Kitty replies, and he frowns at the troubled look that darkens her face. All he wants is to see her happy, to see that brilliant smile that he swears could light up even the blackest of nights.

"All right, I'll tell you a story," he says, and she looks down at him expectantly, "about an evil dragon…"

She waits for him to go on.

"…named Kitty," he continues, and he earns a smack on the head for that. Ryder just laughs at her and goes on. "Kitty the Dragon was a ferocious creature who could burn a whole house with just one fiery breath."

She starts to giggle despite herself.

"She burned whole villages, and all of the townspeople lived in constant fear of her wrath. One day, Kitty the Dragon decided that she wanted to live in the castle, so she took it over and spent her days eating the various members of the royal family for dinner."

Ryder chuckles at Kitty's horrified expression. "This is a terrible story," she exclaims. "Why are boys so violent?"

"The people of the kingdom decided that they had to stop this evil dragon, so they sent their best knight to stop her. He was the bravest, handsomest knight in the whole kingdom," he went on.

"And let me guess," Kitty says wryly, "the knight's name was Ryder?"

"_Sir_ Ryder, actually," he corrects, and she grins, shaking her head exasperatedly at him. "So Sir Ryder went on a brave expedition to the castle to try to defeat Kitty the Dragon. But as he was about to fight her, he realized that Kitty the Dragon didn't need to be killed. She was just lonely."

Kitty rolls her eyes. "Oh, come _on_," she says. "That's so cheesy."

"So Sir Ryder befriended Kitty the Dragon," Ryder adds.

"And they lived happily ever after?" she questions.

Ryder shrugs. "What do you think?" he asks her.

Kitty purses her lips, looking out at the calm water of the lake, mulling it over. "Well, maybe," she says. "Or maybe Kitty got hungry and ate the knight, too," she giggles, and Ryder growls playfully at her, lunges forward, and tackles her into the sand.

It's _them_, so of course what starts as a teasing fight turns into heated kisses, feverish touches, ragged breaths. He can never get enough of her, of the feeling of her small body pressed against his, of her blonde hair running through his fingers, of her lips making him forget everything else but her.

He'd always known Kitty was dangerous, but now he learns every day just how perilous a game he's gotten himself into. Because sure, she's kind of a bitch, just like everyone had warned him, but she can also be agonizingly sweet, she can be hilarious, she can be witty, she can be sad and lost and lonely, she can be perfect. She can be anything, and she's quickly becoming his everything. This…this _thing_ between them was supposed to be just a way for him to get her out of his head, for him to finally achieve his goal of getting the girl he'd been lusting after for a year. But it's spiraled out of his control, and even though Ryder knows he's playing a dangerous game he's kind of okay with it, as long as it means he gets to hold her like this. He thinks he could get used to holding her like this.

They lie on the sand, tangled up in one another, and he runs his hand through her hair gently, listening to the soothing sound of the water. Kitty snuggles into his side, her fingers tracing dizzying patterns into his bare chest. He can feel her breath on his skin from where her face is pressed against his chest.

"I wish we could stay like this forever," Kitty murmurs wistfully into his skin.

He brushes her hair back out of her face fondly. "Can't we?" he asks.

Because now that she says it, Ryder really can't think of anything he'd like more than to stay right here, in this moment, with her, for the rest of time.

He feels her frown into his skin. "Maybe," she replies, and her answer fades into the sticky summer air, it spreads into the sand and is washed away by the never-ending pattern of the waves washing up onto the shore.

..

**june twenty-sixth**

Kitty and Ryder are stretched out on the grass in her backyard, flat on their backs, squinting against the afternoon sun. Ryder is stroking her arm in lazy movements, and that sensation combines with the grass tickling her bare legs to make the essence of her perfect summer.

She rolls her head over to look at him through the blades of grass, but he is already staring back at her, those warm brown eyes memorizing every inch of her face. He might act like the unflappable, confident star football player, but sometimes she catches him looking at her like this, and she knows that he's in over his head.

_He's not the only one_, a nagging little voice pipes up in the back of her mind, but she ignores it and sends a lazy smile in Ryder's direction.

The sunlight is glinting off his messy hair, the lips that she's now kissed countless times are slightly parted, and his eyes, those goddamn fuck-me eyes, are gazing at her like she's the only thing left on earth. Kitty's breath catches in her throat, and she can't get out the words she had been about to say.

"Are you sure your brother's all right?" Ryder asks her, his voice low and gentle through the summer grass, like a caress over her.

Kitty sighs languorously, leaning her head back to let the sun's rays reach her whole face. "Yeah, don't worry about him. He's probably watching TV or playing video games or something."

"If you say so."

Kitty is_ supposed_ to be baby-sitting her seven-year-old brother, but then when has she ever done what she's told? Her parents have a strict no-boys-in-the-house rule, but they're not here and it's summertime and she's restless and Ryder is everything she'd hoped he'd be and more, so much more.

She rolls her eyes. "God, Ryder, stop being so _boring_ and _responsible_ all the time," she mocks.

His eyebrows spring up in faux indignation. "Hey, who're you calling boring?" he demands, and she laughs at how comical his face looks when he's pretending to be angry with her. He rolls so that he's on top of her, his hands tickling her everywhere.

"Stop," Kitty gasps out between bouts of laughter. "Stop it, please!"

"Only if you take back what you said," he counters, his lips springing into a challenging grin.

She smirks at him, because Kitty _never_ admits she was wrong, but then he tickles her side and he's beaming down at her and she caves. "Okay, okay," she shouts. "You're not boring!"

Ryder smiles victoriously and leans down to press a kiss to her forehead. "Thank you," he says in a low voice, and she smiles up at him.

Then he's pressing kisses all over her face, into her hair, on the bridge of her nose, on her cheeks, her jaw, her chin. Kitty sighs with pleasure, and he finally meets her mouth with his, his lips searing into hers.

She moans into his kiss and brings her hands up to pull his head closer to her. "Mmm, _Ryder_."

He groans into her mouth and brings one of his hands down to inch up under her shirt, kissing a line down to her neck. Kitty's head lolls back at how heavenly it all feels, and she just wants more of him, she just wants him closer.

And then they are rudely interrupted by the annoying sound of her little brother's voice, echoing across her backyard – "Kitty, I'm bored!"

Ryder curses under his breath and rolls off of her, lying on his back on the ground next to her, his breath coming out in uneven pants. Kitty pulls her shirt down and tries to suppress any murderous feelings she has toward her sibling. She stands up slowly, pushing her hair back, brushing the grass off her legs, and walks over to her brother.

"Tommy," she says, clenching her teeth. "What impeccable timing," she grits out.

"There's nothing to do," Tommy whines, his lower lip sticking out like the brat he is.

And then Ryder is striding up behind her, laying a large, warm hand on her back reassuringly. Kitty glances up at him and takes in his tousled hair, his swollen lips, his eyes still a little darkened with lust, and she's never regretted not being an only child more.

"Hey, Tom, wanna toss the football around with me?" Ryder asks her brother, and Tommy's eyes light up with excitement.

"Yeah!" he exclaims, and he runs to get his ball.

Kitty sits on the ground and watches as Ryder shows Tommy how to execute a perfect throw. Ryder places his large hands over her brother's on the ball, shows him how to bring his arm back and release. Tommy beams up at him like Ryder is his hero.

As she takes in the sight, Kitty feels a painful twist in a region that's suspiciously close to her heart. She doesn't know when her usual routine of use-him-and-leave-him got tossed to the side, but she does know that the way she feels when she watches Ryder play football with her little brother is something altogether new and unfamiliar and risky.

_What have I gotten yourself into?_ she asks herself, unable to hold back a smile at the sound of Ryder and Tommy laughing, their voices floating up into the clear June sky.

..

**september first**

He sees her in the hallway on the first day back at school, and he has to fight down the impulse to run to her and twirl her in his arms and pepper her hair with kisses, like he had been able to do all summer, when it was just the two of them. Instead, he sends her a cool look of disdain, and she looks at him like he's just another athlete, no one special.

Seeing her in her Cheerios uniform is a sharp reminder of how much he'd wanted her, all of last year, back when she'd just been the hot blonde cheerleader and he'd just been the football player who kept getting distracted by her during games.

His teammate catches Ryder looking at her and mutters in his ear, "Stay away from her, man, she's a crazy bitch," and it's déjà fucking vu. He wants to laugh at how ridiculous it all is – it's like _absolutely nothing_ has changed since last year.

But something has, and he responds to his friend, "Don't worry, I will," his jaw set resolutely, his eyes hard.

As Kitty passes by them in the hall, Ryder notices the way her pink lips are curled into that mysterious smirk, the one that used to haunt his dreams before he knew her. She still looks like she knows a secret, a dangerous and delicious secret that no one else can know.

And they can pretend that they hardly know each other, which they do, and she can treat him like just another football player, which she does, and he can act like he doesn't like her and call her a bitch, which he does, but they both know the truth. They both know the secret now.

..

**july fourth**

The strains of a radio playing the national anthem grow fainter and fainter as Ryder and Kitty edge away from the crowd of people assembled on picnic blankets on the ground. Everyone is in the park to watch Lima's Independence Day fireworks display, but the two of them decide to sneak away before the fireworks start so they can be alone together.

They find themselves in a grassy field, far enough away from all the people near the picnic area so that no one can see them or hear them. Ryder spreads their red blanket on the grass, and Kitty tumbles down onto it, pulling him down with her and laughing as he falls on top of her.

"You're ridiculous," he laughs into her hair, and she smiles into his shirt as he begins to run his fingers up and down her body.

They fool around until the fireworks start, and then they sit nestled into each other on the blanket, Ryder's arm around her, Kitty's head leant against his shoulder. They watch, mesmerized as the explosions of color light up the sky. Red spins into blue flashes into white, and then all that's left is smoke, curling into wispy tendrils before it fades away into the summer sky.

..

**A/N**: My baaaaabies, why am I so cruel to them? I don't know.

I hope you didn't get too confused by my skipping around in time. If you want to go back and read the parts in chronological order, then it goes: 7 (august twenty-seventh), 1 (june fifth), 2 (june eleventh), 6 (august twenty-fifth), 5 (july thirty-first), 3 (june twenty-sixth), 8 (september first), 4 (july fourth).

Please take a moment to leave a review, as I love to hear from other fans of Ryder/Kitty! And if you take the time to favorite, please also review. Thank you for reading!


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